Tradition
by xxlunareclipseoftheheartxx
Summary: "I wanted to, well, it's still a tradition even if you're in prison for war crimes," Ty Lee began and Ozai was unsure what she meant. "I wanted to ask if, I, if I could marry your daughter." / Ozai has a visitor, Ty Lee has a question, the conversation is not one they will easily forget. Oneshot.


**AN: This is just a quick little scene that wouldn't leave my head unless I wrote it down.**

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Ty Lee was not prepared for the sheer level of security at the prison. It was not as if she was heading into the Boiling Rock; it was a white collar place in Caldera where political figures and wealthy merchants were often held... but given who she was visiting, she supposed there were precautions that had to be taken. Ozai had far more friends than was good for Fire Lord Zuko.

She wound up lacking the purse she brought and having her pockets entirely emptied. _Mai probably would have had a bit more trouble getting through security_, she thought with a tiny smile. A fan lay on the table, along with an eyelash curler. Both, of course, very dangerous.

After that, she was led by two guards, whom definitely looked incredibly bored, and she went down the grim hallways. The prison could have used some redecorating, or maybe a painting or two on the walls to make it seem less depressing.

"You have thirty minutes," said one of the guards in utter boredom and Ty Lee knew that if she were Azula or Zuko, she would not have been spoken to that way.

Which quickly reminded her with a stabbing sensation in her gut of why she was here in the first place.

Fire Lord Ozai apparently got a lot of visitors as years passed. Not just Zuko in the night anymore. The popularity of something taboo, girls in love with what was left over after so much of Ozai died. But Ty Lee was not there to profess her love or support. She was about to profess her love for someone else entirely.

He looked surprised when he saw her and she wondered if they did not tell him who was visiting. Shackled to a table, not left in his cell, gradually becoming more accepted and less feared. Treated like more of a human being and less of a slain monster.

It made Ty Lee think that perhaps this would not go as terribly as she worried it would.

"I never thought I'd see the day," Ozai said casually as Ty Lee sat down across from him. The room was much nicer than the others in the prison, almost made to be comforting. Well, Ty Lee supposed, this was where their nation locked up the elite.

"The feeling is mutual," Ty Lee replied as lightly as she could, looking him up and down, eyeing him as if he were a predator even though he posed no harm. "So, how have you been?"

Ozai cocked an eyebrow at that. "How do you think?" he replied and she looked uncomfortable, her cheeks flushing light pink to match her clothes.

He noticed she dressed more like an adult now, nine years after the war ended. Less like a teenage girl and more like a woman. However, he was almost certain that she was one of those Kyoshi Warriors, yet she was dressed in Fire Nation clothes with her hair done in the styles of the nation that made her.

"So, not that great," Ty Lee said, attempting to recover the conversation. "I feel kind of... uh..."

"They said you have thirty minutes. If you want something, I would suggest spitting it out," Ozai said calmly and his tone had not lost its regal, commanding air. Much like his daughter.

Ty Lee squirmed slightly, the question incredibly difficult. It rose in her throat but she struggled. He waited though, looking entertained by her discomfort.

"I wanted to, well, it's still a tradition even if you're in prison for war crimes," Ty Lee began and Ozai was unsure what she meant. "I wanted to ask if, I, if I could marry your daughter."

Ozai looked somewhat confused, and then he just laughed, mirthlessly. Ty Lee squinted at him and felt anger bubbling within her. Once he stopped laughing ─ and he laughed for far too long ─ he looked at her as if she were a kitten who was standing on her back paws, almost like a human.

"What makes you think I would ever say yes?" Ozai asked and Ty Lee looked at her shoes. "Why didn't you ask Zuko? Isn't he her legal guardian or something. He might as well be her father... it isn't as if she's spoken to me in years."

Ty Lee looked up at him. "I think you'll say yes because she's the best thing that's ever happened to me."

"I pity you," Ozai said genuinely and Ty Lee swallowed the insults she wanted to throw. "She's going to ruin you. Burn you or hit you. Because you are nothing to her, in the end."

Ty Lee hesitated. It was not as if she had not had those thoughts before. For every moment of vulnerability as Ty Lee led Azula back to bed after she sleepwalked or every time Ty Lee had calmed her out of a panic attack or they went on a date that went perfectly or they ate cinnamon cotton candy by the pier, there was an incident of malice.

"That's not true," Ty Lee said assuredly and Ozai just shook his head. "She's a lot of things, many of them kind of awful, but she isn't the monster you made her think she is."

"You abandoned her and joined the circus. You betrayed her at the Boiling Rock and broke her heart. _You _singlehandedly ruined my daughter," Ozai said sharply and Ty Lee snapped.

She stood up and said, "Azula and I have done a lot of things to each other. Yes, there's enough blame and betrayal and hated to go around between us. But I love her and I would do anything to have her. I stood by her when she came home. I was the only one who treated her like a human being instead of a broken teacup or a criminally insane lost cause. And I don't need your _permission_ to marry her. It's just a dumb tradition."

Ozai hesitates for a moment. "There you go," he said and she looked bewildered. "You have my blessing."

Ty Lee just stared at him.

And Ozai said, "I think you can stand against her just fine."

Her lips parted in surprise as she felt cheated by his game. But she understood it, somewhat. He wanted her to fight him.

"Thank you," Ty Lee said breathlessly before bowing her head, then feeling ridiculous from the instinctive gesture that no longer applied to disgraced Ozai, and she was on her way.


End file.
